Trish and I ticked off one of our ‘bucket-list’ items this week when we got some rather good seats for the Edinburgh Tattoo. It was spectacular, spine-tingling and very moving. We also managed to briefly take in the atmosphere and madness of the Fringe during our brief trip.

On the plane, I went through The Times which was reporting on the dairy farmers protests at supermarkets. There has got to be something wrong when a four-litre bottle of milk sells for less than a bottle of water. If consumers had an inkling of the hard work and dedication that is involved in the production of milk, or indeed in almost every fresh food delivered to the supermarkets, they would . . . . (no, no they wouldn’t revolt or pay more).

Everyone, including the NFU, acknowledges that over-supply is causing the ongoing problem. However, like much else, the solution will be found in larger, more efficient dairy units. That’s no consolation to the hundreds of dairy farmers going out of business, but the trend is there to see. In 1995, there were just over 28,000 dairy farms in the UK, today that number is nearer 9000. And yet, cattle numbers have dropped by only 7 per cent to 1.8 million (to June 2013), whilst yield per cow has increased by 11 per cent since 2008.

Sad though it is, greater efficiency is the only answer to meeting demand at a price the consumer will pay.

Co-incidentally in the same paper was a report on the Business pages that investors are now getting into agricultural technology in a big way. In the first half of 2015, agtech investment hit $2.06 billion, compared with $2.36 billion in the whole of 2014 (itself a record breaking year).

The attraction is the rapid development of smart farming, data-driven precision agriculture, cloud computing and intelligent information services.

According to one analyst “From 1920 to 2010, agriculture was dominated by bigger and bigger tractors and equipment, and by synthetic fertilisers and seed. What is going to drive growth in the next 30 – 50 years is information technology”.

Data collected on weather, soil conditions, crop yields, equipment efficiency, water and other variables which will have to be analysed and made available to farmers in a bundled concise format.

We are already seeing drones used by farmers to capture aerial imagery of their fields. This use of new technology will slowly (at first) and surely impact on the supporting cast of manufacturers and dealers.

How long before we see the appointment of the first Drone Dealer?